A news story Tuesday caught my attention, for a couple of reasons. One has to do with annexations, which I’ll expound on more shortly. The main attention grabber for me was the planning and land use functions.
The story is about the first approved “preliminary municipality” in the state, a controversial new development adjacent to Moab City in Grand County. The ability to create “preliminary municipalities” was authorized by a bill passed in the 2024 legislative session. A good explanation of what the bill allows was given in another Moab Times-Independent story earlier this year:
The Utah Legislature passed SB258 in last year’s session, allowing landowners to establish preliminary municipalities — privately governed entities with control over zoning, land use and infrastructure without local government oversight.
These municipalities do not have taxing authority but can enter agreements with utility providers, oversee development and implement land-use policies. Before a preliminary municipality can fully incorporate into a town, it must meet one of two conditions:
– Reach 100 permanent residents within four years of issuing its first Certificate of Occupancy, or
– Reach 100 permanent residents within six years of becoming a preliminary municipality.
Once that threshold is met, local registered voters must approve incorporation in an election. If the incorporation vote passes, the town gains full municipal authority, including taxing power. If neither threshold is met, the area reverts to county control.
Notice the reference to control over zoning and land use. The wording of SB258 says that a preliminary municipality (PM) “has the same authority as another municipality to make decisions regarding zoning and land use.” So, following the state code and the processes of municipal planning and land use authority, that would mean the PM has to have a planning commission. Generally, most PMs will have no, or very few, permanent residents yet, so appointments to the PC will almost certainly have to be people who do not live within the boundaries of the PM. And since the governing body of a PM is made up of a board nominated by the sponsor of the PM petition (usually a property owner, e.g., developer), that would likely mean the governing body and the PC will be made up primarily of representatives of the developer of the property in the PM. That could be interesting. Who would wind up serving as staff to such a PC? The staff of the developer?
The apparent motivation behind the bill in 2024 was to help a stymied developer. Rep. Mike Kohler of Heber City, in the Times-Independent story, who voted for the bill in 2024,
… acknowledged he did not fully scrutinize the bill at the time and now believes it grants landowners too much control over development while limiting county oversight.
“Somebody could buy a piece of property … develop that property under this new rule, and they can go in and basically do whatever they want on that property, both in density and development, [while] the county can say nothing about it,” Kohler said on the House floor.
Rep. Kohler sponsored a bill in the last legislative session, HB540, that would have done away with the provisions for PMs, and while it passed the House, it failed to come up for a final vote in the Senate before the end of the session.
There are now at least 4 pending applications for PMs at various locations around the state.
Cities adjacent to proposed PMs also would have no say in what happens with them and the development they are proposing. This is a topic that will be of some discussion in an upcoming working group on annexation policy for the state, and how annexation could be a better tool for managing growth. Cities in Utah are charged with creating an annexation policy plan, showing areas that they anticipate and plan to be a part of their community in the future. In a number of states, municipalities have extraterritorial power to control to some extent what kind development may take place on their boundaries. Is this something that should be considered here? Perhaps! It is a point worthy of discussion.
However, this whole issue of PMs seems to really throw a wrench into the works!